Easy Ways to Cook Delicious Chicken

Chicken is an extremely versatile, useful food to cook, and it's quite healthy plus low in calories and fat too. And if that weren't enough to make it a very popular main dish ingredient, chicken happens to be very inexpensive too.

Unfortunately though, some of us cook chicken so often that we seem to run out of ideas for new ways to use it. And sometimes figuring out what to do with the leftovers can be a bit trying too. So with that in mind, here are a few quick and easy ways to cook chicken that you may not have tried before.

1. Broiled Chicken Breasts - This is a very simple way to cook chicken in a healthy manner. Simply lay your chicken breasts on an oven grill pan, brush them with olive oil, sprinkle a bit of cayenne pepper over them, and broil them until they're no longer pink in the middle. The cooking time will vary based on the size and thickness of the breasts.

2. Chicken Fajitas - Chicken fajitas are quite easy to make: Simply buy some fajita seasoning at your local grocery store. Then slice your chicken into strips, and cook them in a skillet with the fajita seasoning. This is all that's required. You can eat the chicken as is once it's finished cooking, or you can wrap it in a warm flour or wheat tortilla.

If you'd like to dress them up even more though, and create a full healthy meal: Add strips of green and red bell peppers, plus strips of onions to the pan while the chicken is cooking.

Also chop up some fresh raw tomatoes, tear up a leaf or two of lettuce, and shred some cheddar cheese. Once your chicken and vegetable mix is finished cooking, here's how to assemble the deluxe fajitas:

- Spoon some of the meat and vegetable mixture onto a warm tortilla
- Sprinkle cheese, tomatoes, and lettuce evenly across the top
- Put a dollop of sour cream on top
- Roll the tortilla and eat! :)

3. Chicken Salad - There are actually many ways to make chicken salad, but one of the easiest is to simply put left over cooked chicken into your favorite salad green mix. If, for instance, you usually eat a salad which simply consists of lettuce and tomato with a bit of dressing, then you can make it more of a meal by simply adding your leftover chicken and some cheese to it. Simply cut up the chicken or pull it apart with your fingers, and either shred the cheese or cut it into small cubes. Then toss those into your salad mix and you have a wonderful, more fulfilling meal.

4. Chicken and Dumplings - This is an old-fashioned favorite of mine that I love using either left over chicken or left over turkey for. Recipes can vary widely, but I like to make mine like a soup. Sometimes I'll add cut carrots, onions, and celery to the mix, while other times I simply stick with meat and dumplings. You can make plain biscuit style dumplings, or add some cheese or seasonings to the batter to create new taste variations too.